South Sudan peace talks falter as Uganda sends in troops

A peace march in Juba on Wednesday denouncing the fighting between the president and the deposed vice-president's camps. Photograph: Charles Atiki Lomodong/AFP

The South Sudan peace talks^[1] being held in Ethiopia have stalled, officials say, as a rebel commander claims big victories against the South Sudanese government and Uganda^[2] sends in more troops and military hardware.

Even as several dozen people held a peace march in Juba, South Sudan^[3]'s capital, on Wednesday, there was little evidence that the conflict is moving toward resolution, more than three weeks after spiralling violence broke out.

Two officials in Ethiopia said the peace talks had stalled over the issue of political prisoners. The special envoy of Igad, a bloc of East African countries, has flown to Juba to speak about political detainees.

A political dispute that turned violence on 15 December has since become ethnic in dimension. President Salva Kiir^[4], a Dinka, says his former vice-president, Riek Machar, a Nuer, tried to launch a coup. The latter denies this and is demanding the release of 11 high-level detainees. Kiir has said they will be released according to the country's judicial process.

A spokesman for the Machar side in Ethiopia, Brigadier General Lul Raui Kong, a member of South Sudan's armed forces who has defected, spoke in an interview on Wednesday about military battles between the country's army and renegade troops.

Kong said that in the battle for Bor, the state capital of Jonglei about 70 miles north of Juba, rebel fighters destroyed two T-72 tanks and four military trucks. He said his side has killed dozens of government soldiers, including a general, outside Bor. There was no way to verify the claim. Kong said his side has benefited from senior defections in the states of Central Equatorial, Upper Nile and Jonglei.

Uganda, he said, had sent 1,200 troops to secure installations such as the airport and state house, adding that Ugandan military aircraft had bombed several rebel-held positions.

Uganda says its deployment of more troops and military hardware to Juba this week came at the request of Kiir. Lieutenant Colonel Paddy Ankunda, a Ugandan military spokesman, said on Wednesday that reinforcements were dispatched on Monday and Tuesday "to plug security gaps". He denied the Ugandans were actively involved in combat.

Yoweri Museveni^[5], the president of Uganda, is a strong ally of Kiir. The neighbouring countries have built a bond that goes back to South Sudan's armed struggle for independence from Sudan and the Khartoum government. Museveni recently warned Machar that East African countries would unite to defeat him militarily if he does not agree to attend peace talks.

Some analysts say Museveni distrusts Machar and that stems, in part, from the latter's alleged links to the Ugandan warlord Joseph Kony, who once operated in jungles that now fall in South Sudan's territory and with the alleged support of Sudan's government.

In 2005, as South Sudan moved closer to autonomy, Kony agreed to negotiate with Uganda's government under the mediation of Machar. Those talks failed and, in late 2008, Kony and his top commanders fled their base in the forests of east Congo only hours before Uganda's military moved in to launch an aerial assault. Some in Uganda's military believe Machar warned Kony of the impending attack.

"Machar is an independent actor whose shifting loyalties – especially his ability to work with Khartoum – probably unnerves Museveni, who sees his assent to power in South Sudan as riskier for Ugandan interests," said Angelo Izama, a Ugandan analyst who runs Fanaka Kwawote, a regional security thinktank. "Even now I suspect he considers Machar as a proxy for Khartoum ... Any situation that gives Machar advantage may be considered a danger to Museveni and a direct threat to Uganda."

References

1. ^{^} South Sudan peace talks (www.theguardian.com)
2. ^{^} More from the Guardian on Uganda (www.theguardian.com)
3. ^{^} More from the Guardian on South Sudan (www.theguardian.com)
4. ^{^} President Salva Kiir (www.theguardian.com)
5. ^{^} Yoweri Museveni (www.theguardian.com)